Wood Quality and its Biological Basis

Wood is the most versatile raw material available to man. It is burned as fuel, shaped into utensils, used as a structural engineering material, converted into fibres for paper production, and put to newer uses as a source of industrial chemicals. Its quality results largely from the chemical and physical structure of the cell walls of its component fibres, which can be modified in nature as the tree responds to physical environmental stresses. Internal stresses can accumulate, which are released catastrophically when the tree is felled, often rendering the timber useless. The quality of timber as an engineering material also depends on the structure of the wood and the w…